The Company was established to acquire residential property primarily in Berlin and, to a lesser extent, cities in the former East Germany, in accordance with the Company’s investment objective and investing policy.

The Directors aim has been to acquire properties that they believe will benefit from the recovery in Berlin property prices from previously depressed levels. Most of the properties so far purchased for the Company’s portfolio were acquired for under €1,100 per square metre, which is estimated at less than half replacement cost.

Taliesin’s strategy has been to buy portfolios and individual buildings directly from owners or out of administration. To maximise capital appreciation, Taliesin undertakes various degrees of refurbishment on the properties as a means of driving up rents. Aside from a search for yield at a time of low interest rates, the investment case for Berlin residential includes a number of unique selling points, including: a rising population; increasingly smaller households; years of underinvestment in property; low home ownership of circa 15% as compared with about 50% across Germany; and Berlin’s cachet as a capital city.

The Company also takes advantage of the premium that individual apartments sell at relative to the cost of whole buildings, by converting parts of its portfolio into condominiums and "privatising" individual units.

Taliesin is financed by a combination of equity, senior loans (from German banks) and Zero Dividend Preference Shares and has kept leverage to modest levels. In addition, Taliesin has eschewed “value trap” investments in the high-yielding post-war “prefab” estates of Berlin in favour of more mature buildings in central locations of the city.

ORGANISATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE

The Directors have appointed Taliesin Management Limited (“TML”) to provide the Company with investment advisory services.

The Board of Taliesin Property Fund Limited, following a request from TML has appointed JJ Investment Management Limited as joint investment adviser alongside TML.

The Board of TML have a broad range of experience relevant to getting the most from the business concept and each of the TML directors own significant stakes in Taliesin shares.

TML has created a locally-staffed Berlin-based company (Taliesin Deutschland) to engage in portfolio acquisition and asset management, providing a local presence which helps to maintain a pipeline of potential property acquisition opportunities.

Taliesin’s portfolio is held in a number of local companies and special purpose vehicles to ensure tax efficiency: these entities are administered by Taliesin Deutschland. Day-to-day property management is outsourced and undertaken by Core Immobilien, a local property management specialist, under the supervision of Taliesin Deutschland.